Food & Drink 1985 Saint-Emillion Grand Cru - good to drink?

Hi,

I turned 28 recently and I received a lot of wine from friends. My brother got me something different thought.

a 1985 Saint Emillion Grand Cru from Chateau Cotes Trois Moulins

Obviously these were/are brilliant wines and would prefer to drink it and keep the bottle. However this wine is almost 28 years old... how are the odds that I can even drink this? Should I just keep it or sell it?

Google didn't tell me much except I could still find positive wine reviews on this kind of wine from 1985. So some people still seem to drink them.

thanks

 

First, 99% of wines have a peak drinking point. After that, only rarely is there a vintage that survives a longer aging process, hence their pricing.

You need to drink it. and here are a few tips:

a) Pick a special moment, but not too special that the wine will ruin it. I like to use a Friday for this.

b) Have a great back up wine that you know will not be corked or spoiled. better to have 2.

c) Study up on the expected palate of the wine and match some great food. This is not the bottle to experiment with or switch things up with. Good food will make this wine. And have some water handy, the tannins on wines this old can really dry out the mouth.

d) Decant. into a proper decanter. It will not only help the flavors develop, it will help keep the sediment out of your glasses. And it's classy. I decant almost all my wines, even the $20 grocery store ones; mainly because I'm a mad pimp. Then give it 10 minutes to breath, but finish it in 30-40min. The time is short because of the age, don't sip this all night. You have a small window, which is one of the reasons I think you need a second bottle, in case this one goes off.

e) Use the right glasses. You can get away with using one red wine glass for all reds when dealing with cheaper, younger wines. But this complex (assuming it is) and this old you want to give the wine every chance to blossom.

f) Opening it is dicey. Look at the cork for discoloration. If the cork is moldy or stained, it might be off. Touch the cork, if the cork is coming off in a dust or is gritty, it might be dried out and brittle. Either way, use a proper wine key, not some fancy gadget. Go slow, get the screw seated properly in the center and straight in. Give it all the meat to grab onto that you can. Pull firmly and with a steady pressure. No jerking or sudden moves that will shred the cork. Avoid popping the cork out.

g) Savor it. Look at the color in the light. Stick your nose into the glass and breath a few times, and think about what you experience. Drink some, drawing air into your mouth to aerate it. swallow it and drink some more. pay attention to how the flavor moves through your mouth and changes sip to sip. All that good jazz. Resist the urge to swirl, it does nothing.

 

or...

a) drink it

 

drink it like you would any other wine...

If you're worried about sediment decant it into a jug first...

and have plan b in the event it's corked or crap...

 

GF is coming over for dinner on sunday. I'll serve it then, any evening with her is special enough, without it being a 'special occassion' for any particular evening.

Have plenty of plan b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j in my little wine stash. No worries.

Will make sure to decant it.

thanks for the feedback, just what I was hoping for: Drink it!

 

Not sure if you were concerned about value but this isn't a very grand St Emilion I'm afraid, despite the "grand cru". (GC doesn't actually denote anything in St. Emilion, it only ensures that it is over 12.5% alcohol, and a couple of other things that relate to the appellation, cépage, stuff like that. It needs to be Grand Cru Classé to be of any significance, although granted the rating systems are a bit corrupt unfortunately.)

DO NOT DECANT IT. 1985s at the top quality are mostly at their apogee right now, and I'm afraid to say this is not one. The good news is 1985 was a beautiful vintage (one of my favourites, very balanced), so there's a good chance it'll be enjoyable.

My advice, is do something known as the "audoze method" - it'll probably be somewhat over the hill but still enjoyable, to get the best out of these wines, open them about 8-10 hours before, very carefully, and then leave them in the bottle, with the cork out, be very gentle, don't rock it about etc. Decanting it will make it just fall apart and lose all the fruit. When you're ready to drink, just pour very carefully indeed.

I don't mean to attack another member but I'm afraid some of the info JJ has given is just not true, particularly point f) - if the cork is mouldy on the top, that means not a lot, some of the finest wines I've had, had mould, it's pretty normal. The cork might crumble into a million pieces, it might be totally sodden, and everything in between. None of these things mean it is "off" with any certainty. Swirling in the glass absolutely does plenty, it has the same effect of decanting and aerating the wine. If the wine doesn't taste or smell of much, give it some swirling in the glass. The wine itself will very likely change over the course of the time in the glass. However, JJ is absolutely right in the quality of the glass, as good as you can get (see if you can hire some from a local wine merchant), and it should have the thinnest rim possible and the biggest bowl possible. JJ also refers to a potentially short "alive" time - it's quite hard to tell with these minor wines as occasionally they are spectacular and really evolve over a few hours, but equally it has a high risk of falling apart, hence why I say don't decant it. You'll get more time in the glass that way. Also, leave 1 glass until the end of the night, just so you can experience how the wine changes with air.

Temperature is pretty important with these wines too - room temperature doesn't really apply anymore and I'd be looking to drink this at about 16-17-18 degrees C. 20 and upwards and you'll start losing out and tasting the alcohol more than the fruit.

1985 was not a particularly tannic vintage in St. Emilion, so I would pair it with something pretty subtle, fillet steak that hasn't been aged very long will be fine, but stay away from pepper. It's not going to stand up to cheese or any intense flavours. In fact if it were me, I'd probably drink it with bread and butter, and focus on the wine a bit more rather than food.

Look for particular smells. Wet dog or cardboard smells would indicate cork taint, but that would be pretty unlikely (less than 1%). Your biggest risk here is oxidation from poor storage in my opinion, and from that the wine will likely be very murky (it should be totally clear, and somewhat brick red in colour at the edges of the glass), and smell a bit of maderia/pretty disgusting. If it's good, you can expect some pencil lead and tobacco on the nose.

How far is the wine level from the "shoulder" of the bottle? If it's into the neck or at the base of the neck, then you stand a good chance. Any lower and then you should be keeping your fingers crossed. (Guide to levels: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ullage_(wine) )

As for my reference point on this comment....nearly 10 years and as many thousands spent drinking, studying, researching and learning about wine.

Absolutely drink it, but don't weigh the whole night on it, so it doesn't spoil the evening if it doesn't work out - it's wine, it happens.

Remember, there's no such thing as a great wine, only a great bottle.

 

My wife (ex-wine buyer) says that the beauty of wine is that it is an adventure; you're never absolutely sure what you're going to get. Humble non-vintage table wines may turn out to be lovely; dusty old bottles presumed to be way past their peak turn out to be an unexpected surprise.

We've had a Garrafeira that was 26 years old --way past its date, and it was beautiful (but the little bit left in the bottle had turned into vinegar by the next day). We've bought bin ends of champagne that were seven years old --again, well past their date, that were awesome.

Every bottle is a unique experience.

 

You guys have turned drinking a glass of wine into brain surgery. It honestly takes me less steps to build a fully capable hunting-weight selfbow. If I push myself and have everything on hand, I can even do it in an evening.

This whole thread puzzles me. Based on the communion wine every Sunday (which is all the experience I've had or wanted to have with it) you're all arguing over how to drink what smells like rotten fruit and tastes like vinegar. Before someone starts, yes, I don't get it. I understand that. I'm guessing that I would liken it to coffee, which I'm now allowed to have again.

Based both on the level of research required and the science needed apparently to enjoy it, I'll keep my coffee and selfbow. To OP, whatever it is you're expecting from the bottle, I hope it exceeds it. I know it was a gift, I know it's supposed to be decent and I know what a vintage is. Past that I'm lost.

But, if it's not too much trouble while you jump through all those hoops to drink it, remember your brother who can't have any more wine than dipping his communion wafer in the wine every Sunday. I'll lift a coffee mug for you in return.

 

Tomatoe, tomahto. I like to decant. And I find that almost all people swirl so much, they might as well add bubbles to it. I advise people to resist it, because I know they will anyways and it helps them to not do it too much. I'm sorry, 20 minutes of swirling wine is just idiotic, but watch people at wine tasting. It's like the advice that people can never let go of.

The advice is valid for 98% of the wine out there; particularly since the OP seems to know little about wine. It's not like he discovered a lost cellar of the Czars.

 

Well it's not really tomaeto - tomahto, as I say I have no intention of attacking or directly arguing with another member; but decanting an '85 StE of this quality is madness. I base that on experiences of at least 10 StEs and at least 40 over the greater Bordeaux region, and that's in 1985 alone. Add in the rest of the 80s and itd be more like 500. Decanting this for any significant period of time will only detract. End of story. For many other wines, yes, decanting is a valid and a correct thing to do.

I'm not suggesting that anyone should swirl a wine for twenty minutes, but if you want to get a bit of air in the wine because it's being a bit tough and unyielding, it's a completely normal way of doing it. I'm curious on why you are so adamantly against the concept. Watch any of the great masters of wine as they taste, they all do it, and they sure as hell know a lot more than me or you. Ultimately, giving the wine a swirl does the same thing as sticking it in a decanter so I'm not sure why you're so against it. It's much more controllable too.

 

Yep, it's just old, sour grape juice. OP - just make a birthday beef casserole and pour it in there

I don't get wine either (well I get it enough to have had a bottle of £5 red last night), so don't take me too seriously.

As a smoker I am precluded from tasting subtle nuances by default. Same with dry Champagne/Prosecco/Cava - they all taste like fizzy white wine to me. On the plus side this saves me a lot of money.

 

I had no idea.....Smokey shirts.

I love wine. My brother in law is a buyer, and as such I get access to all the tasties

 

A Ti straw boshed though the cork will remove most concerns over the cork falling apart and over aerating the wine, slurp up, profit maybe.

 

Me neither. I've also no idea why 'Shirty', but I'm sure that's another story for another day.

A relative of mine used to be a serious wine importer, so we've got quite a collection of nice things to quaff. The problem that I have is finding the right occasion (and then not breaking the cork)...

 

"A good Burgundy smells of ****" --Anthony Hanson

I hope it's Monsoon Malabar. Coffee is, after all, as important and complicated a drink as wine.

Actually, you can get some really nice bottles of wine for less than £5,-- at Aldi.

If Champagne, Prosecco and Cava all taste the same that's because they all are, basically, the same thing. Champagne is named after the region of production rather than the method, which is essentially quite similar to that of Prosecco. It uses an earlier picked grape with higher sugar content, and like with Cava secondary fermentation happens in the bottle rather than in stainless steel tanks as is the case with Prosecco, but that's basically it. As a result the production method (champagnoise traditional method) is named after the drink rather than the other way around. A good Prosecco or Cava can easily knock spots off lesser Champagnes (Moet & Chandon, for instance, which is released too friggin' early).

 

Ah, Monsoon Malabar. I love it.

 

That and they can't blend for ****. Although recent bottlings have improved I think. But yes, give it another 5 years in bottle and it starts becoming worth drinking.

The Moet vintage is actually pretty good for the money, and often on offer. I got a few cases at like 27 quid a bottle which is pretty bargainlicious.

I'd rather drink Selosse though....

 

I have some pretty alternate advice.

Firstly go out and buy and axe, a Russian fur hat. Next get thoroughly embalmed with vodka, the good tasteless kind. Arrive home as arranged with girlfriend later than her. Use axe to break open front door, keys are for children. If any doors are in your way, kick as to opening them normally. Punch anyone in your way.

Discard the axe, bellow at the top of your lungs in some indistinguishable fashion, grab the bottle of wine, and smash the neck off. Drink in a long single drought. Throw empty bottle at television. Proceed to pass out and defecate yourself.

You will then most likely wake up either in a). the bathtub or b). someone elses stairs.

 

Charles Heidsieck myself (or Krug, but that is an extravagance beyond my budget). I like my champagne dry but biscuity.

Dom Perignon seems a bit overrated to me. What do you think?

The best one I have ever had is from the Algerian Coffee Company in Soho, London. Waitrose does a cheaper, very acceptable substitute. Avoid the Sainsbury's one; it is a bit bland.

 

I know I'm not who the Q was aimed at... only had Dom Perignon once... it was crap and gave me a bad stomach... the £300 price tag didn't help it's case any...

I can see why they smash it off boats... you wouldn't want to drink it...